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In many countries, the start dates and end dates for daylight saving time (DST) change from year to year. Additionally, countries may change their policy of recognizing daylight saving time, or they may change the local time offset from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

Daylight saving time implementation varies from country to country. Some countries may not observe daylight saving time, whereas other countries may change the start dates and end dates for daylight saving time every year.

For more detailed information, please find this article which describes how to update a Windows-based computer to use the latest global time zone rules as of December 2007.

The following list shows some of the major changes that have occurred for daylight saving time:

• Argentina: DST is being introduced in Argentina.

• Brazil: There are different DST dates in Brazil.

• Canada: All provinces in Canada that use daylight saving time have adopted the same changes as the United States.

• Chile: There are different DST dates in Chile.

• Egypt: There are different DST dates in Egypt.

• Iran: DST is being reintroduced.

• Iraq: Iraq no longer observes DST.

• Israel: There are different DST dates in Israel.

• Mexico: Mexico has not adopted the DST changes that were made in the United States. Therefore, separate time zone definitions must be used for Mexico.

• Morocco: DST is being introduced in Morocco.

• Pakistan: DST is being reintroduced in Pakistan.

• Sri Lanka: The local time offset has changed from UTC+6:00 to UTC+5:30.

• United States: Beginning in the spring of 2007, the start dates and end dates for daylight saving time (DST) will change to comply with the Energy Policy Act of 2005. DST dates for 2007 in the United States and Canada will start three weeks earlier (2:00 A.M. on the second Sunday in March), and will end one week later (2:00 A.M. on the first Sunday in November).

• Uruguay: A new time zone has been created for Montevideo, Uruguay.

To obtain the list of time zones that have changed together with their DST start dates and end dates, use the information in the following Knowledge Base article:

I found this wonderful article describes the optimization of memory usage on your computer that is running Exchange Server 2003.

For example, if you have 1 gigabyte (GB) or more of physical memory (RAM) installed on a server that is running Microsoft Exchange Server 2003, you must make sure that Exchange 2003 can make efficient use of that memory. Please Note: Exchange 2003 performs an optimal memory configuration check when the store process starts. If the memory settings are not optimal, you will see event 9665 in Event Viewer. This message appears if one or more of the following conditions are true, as specified in the MSDN article.

Do you know why personal folder files (.PST files) are unsupported over a local area network (LAN) or wide area network (WAN) link?

The .PST files are not meant to be a long-term, continuous-use method of storing messages in an enterprise environment.

Although it is possible to specify a network directory or a Universal Naming Convention (UNC) path as a storage location for a .PST file, network usage is not meant to be a long-term, continuous-use method of storing messages in an enterprise environment.

As you know that a .PST file is a file-access-driven method of message storage. File-access-driven means that the computer uses special file access commands that the operating system provides to read and write data to the file. This is not efficient on WAN or LAN links because WAN/LAN links use network-access-driven methods, commands the operating system provides to send data to or receive from another networked computer.

Other Behaviors of .PST Files over WAN/LAN Links

•All operations take longer.

• Write operations can take approximately four times longer than read operations.

As you know, the Messaging API (COM-like API) that provides access to the contents of messaging stores. CDO 1.2.1 (Collaboration Data Objects, version 1.2.1) is a package providing access to Outlook-compatible objects through a COM-based API. Using either CDO or MAPI, a program can connect to a MAPI store, and then perform operations against that store.

Starting from Exchange 2007, neither the Messaging API (MAPI) client libraries nor CDO 1.2.1 are provided as a part of the base product installation. As a result, there is functionality missing that many applications depend on. Microsoft Exchange MAPI and CDO 1.2.1 provide access to these API's.

From Exchange 2007, Microsoft will distribute the MAPI client libraries and CDO 1.2.1 as a Web download.

Please note: This version is now compatible with Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. Note also that this web release follows the Microsoft Lifecycle policy of Exchange Server 2003, which goes into Extended Support in April 2009.

Argument & its definition:sender address : Required. Address of a local mailbox. Used to verify SMTP submission and check inbound DNS.

recipient address: Required. E-mail address of remote mailbox you are trying to send mail to. Used to verify DNS, and remote mailbox availability.

-d target DNS :Optional. IP address of target DNS server to use to look up remote MX (mail exchange) records for testing. This is configured as an external DNS server in Exchange. Please note that the external DNS setting is not available for Internet Information Services (IIS) SMTP.

/v: Optional. Displays additional information about each test.

/?: Displays Help

Results:

Please Note: The results will be color coded in the syntax. It will have the following colors and its definition:

People today depend on being able to stay in touch no matter how close or how far away they are from the office or home.

For businesses, that means a host of challenges to make sure their communications foundation is secure, reliable and accessible across many mobile devices – from notebooks to PDAs and smartphones.

Microsoft has been helping companies overcome those challenges and streamline their communications infrastructure with Microsoft Exchange Server 2007, and the popularity of Exchange Server 2007 among corporations has influenced many mobile device makers to support Exchange right out of the box.

Today, Apple announced it plans to join the list of mobile device makers that offer built-in support for Exchange mobile e-mail, licensing Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync for the iPhone.

For a detailed information, please find the following article, which was represented by Terry Myerson, corporate vice president for Exchange, talks to PressPass about the importance of the new agreement between Microsoft and Apple to offer built-in support for Exchange on the iPhone, and the increasing popularity of Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 among mobile professionals.

Recently I was working with one of my customer, we came across a strange issue.

He has MS Outlook 2007 which was running on Windows Vista. He updated that it takes long time to download an e-mail message from a POP3 server in Microsoft Office Outlook 2007. Whenever they download a mail with attachment (for example .5 megabyte (MB) message), the download takes more than one hour.

Additionally, when they send e-mail messages by using the SMTP server of their Internet service provider (ISP), they get time out issue and also got the following error message:

At the end of the research, we found the issue happens due to "TCP Scaling", a new feature introduced in Windows Vista. This problem occurs if a network hardware device, such as a router, does not support TCP Window Scaling.

Error message 3 : The data file filename was not closed properly’. This file is being checked for problems.

If you receive one or more of these error messages, you may experience performance issues until Outlook finishes the reconciliation process for the .ost file or for the .pst file. The following gear icon is displayed in the status bar while Outlook checks the data file in the background:

When this icon disappears, the .pst file or the .ost file is reconciled. If you exit Outlook while the gear icon is present, reconciliation must restart the next time that you run Outlook. It's recommended that you leave Outlook running until the gear icon disappears before you exit Outlook.

An incorrectly shut down .ost file or .pst file may occur for one of the following reasons:

Please find this article, which provides a collection of resources to help you understand potential issues around Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 performance, and to assist you in configuring features for best performance in your organization...

Do you know, these symptoms are most noticeable during mail delivery or during synchronization. These symptoms become more pronounced as store size increases. They are more likely to occur when the size of the .pst file or the size of the .ost file approaches 2 gigabytes (GB). Additionally, they are more pronounced in a very large .pst file or in a very large .ost file that is 4 GB or larger.

For more information, please find this wonderful article, which talks about how to troubleshoot the performance issues in Outlook 2007 and with respect to larger .pst or .ost files.

In this series, we will learn "How to create Outlook Preview Handlers in Outlook 2007 ?". First we'll know what is Preview Handlers and where it can be used, along with a downloadable sample.

What are Preview Handlers and where it's used?

Preview handlers are called when an item is selected to show a lightweight, rich, read-only preview of the file's contents in the view's reading pane. This is done without launching the file's associated application.

Martijn Hoogendoorn inspired & created a Shockwave Flash preview handler and available in this wonderful article along with installer sample. Basically, it's just a plain UserControl which hosts the ActiveX wrapper for the player. It works from both Outlook 2007 and Windows Vista.

In this series, we will learn "How to customize Outlook 2007 (Office 2007) Ribbon functionality". I found these below given MSDN articles which describes how we can customize Office 2007 (including Outlook 2007) ribbon functionality.

In this series, we will learn "How to systematically release the objects - Add-in's for Outlook 2003 & Outlook 2007 ?". I found this MSDN article which describes how all Outlook add-ins should systematically release their references to Outlook objects when they are no longer needed. Failing to systematically release reference to Outlook objects can prevent Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 & Outlook 2007 from shutting down properly.

When you try to start Microsoft Office Outlook 2003, the program does not start. Additionally, you receive the following error message:

"Cannot start Microsoft Office Outlook. MAPI32.DLL is corrupt or the wrong version. This could have been caused by installing other messaging software. Please reinstall Outlook."

Do you know....this issue may occur if you install and then uninstall Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 Beta 2 on a computer that has Outlook 2003 installed. When you uninstall Outlook 2007 Beta 2 version, the Outlook 2007 Beta 2 version of the MSMapi32.dll file is not removed from the following folder on your computer: "C:\Program Files\Common Files\System\Msmapi\LocaleID"

Please view this useful MSDN KB Article. It has the information about the issue, its cause, resolution for this issue

In this series, we will learn "How to update existing items in an Outlook folder to use a new custom form?". I found this MSDN article which describes programatically how to update existing items in an Outlook folder to use a new custom form?

This article describes how to update items in an Outlook folder so that those items open using a different form than the form that the items are currently associated with.

When using a custom form containing a ListBox control, Outlook unexpectedly adds a new possible value to the control.

Do you know....this behavior is due to the storage limitation of Keywords fields. If the control is bound to a field of type Keywords and you select a number of possible values in the control, the field may exceed its 255-character maximum length. This causes the last value to be truncated. Because the custom Keywords field now contains a new value that is not one of the options in the control, Outlook adds this new value to the list of possible choices in the control.

Please view this useful MSDN KB Article. It has the information about the issue, its cause, re-solution for this issue

A digital signature is used to authenticate (The process of verifying that people and products are who and what they claim to be. For example, confirming the source and integrity of a software publisher's code by verifying the digital signature used to sign the code.) digital information — such as documents, e-mail messages, and macros — by using computer cryptography.

Digital signatures helps us,

To establish the following assurances:

Authenticity The digital signature helps to assure that the signer is who they claim to be.

Integrity The digital signature helps to assure that the content has not been changed or tampered with since it was digitally signed.

Non-repudiation The digital signature helps to prove to all parties the origin of the signed content. "Repudiation" refers to the act of a signer's denying any association with the signed content.

To make these assurances, the content must be digitally signed by the content creator, using a signature that satisfies the following criteria:

The digital signature is valid (Refers to the status of a certificate checked against a certificate authority's database and found to be legitimate, current, and not expired or revoked. Documents signed by a valid certificate and not altered since signing are considered valid.).

The certificate (A digital means of proving identity and authenticity. Certificates are issued by a certification authority, and like a driver's license, can expire or be revoked.) associated with the digital signature is current (not expired).

The signing person or organization, known as the publisher, is trusted (The developer of a macro that is trusted by you on your computer. The trusted publisher is identified by the certificate that they used to digitally sign the macro. Also known as a trusted source.).

The certificate associated with the digital signature is issued to the signing publisher by a reputable certificate authority (CA) (A commercial organization that issues digital certificates, keeps track of who is assigned to a certificate, signs certificates to verify their validity, and tracks which certificates are revoked or expired.).